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- Sermon 2006-11-12 The Widow's Offering
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Mon, 13 Nov 2006 02:50:30 -0600
Sermon Sunday, November 12, 2006 +----------------------------------------+ | Twenty-third Sunday after Pentecost | +----------------------------------------+ [9]Mark 12:38-44 * A widow*s generosity reveals the hypocrisy of the scribes THE WIDOW'S OFFERING While waiting in the HEB pharmacy some time ago, I sat down to check my blood pressure. Along the wall, next to the cuff into which you slide your arm is a sheet of thick Plexiglas with three or four holes a little bit bigger than the size of a quarter. Sure enough, someone had gotten the bright idea of dropping a couple of quarters, some dimes and a handful of pennies through the hole and into the space between the plastic and the wall. All tolled it appeared to be about seventy-five cents, chump change these days. But judging by the chips and cracks in the plastic though, what was also evident was the fact that probably more than one person had tried unsuccessfully to retrieve the change. *An awful lot of fuss for just a few small coins.* I thought to myself. *A lot of fuss for just a few small coins.* I guess we could make the same conclusion about Jesus too. One day he sat down opposite the treasury and watched people put in their money. *Many rich people put in large sums, but a poor widow came and put in two small coins, worth about a penny.* To the disciples he said, *She has put in more than all those who are contributing the treasury. For she, out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.* Those like us who know the difference between a large and a small sum are left to ponder Jesus* peculiar accounting. A single penny worth more than a *large sum*? What could Jesus possibly be talking about? I don*t suppose it*s any accident that the widow and her coins make their appearance at this time of the year in the life of the church. It is November after all. Time for churches everywhere to start worrying about next year*s budget and the poor widow serves as the perfect model for us all. If everyone adopted her type of sacrificial giving then our money problems would disappear and we*d be on the right track. So, open up your pocket books folks and give until it hurts. But of course anyone who understands anything about money will tell you two cents ain*t much in the grand scheme of things. The widow*s act makes for a good Reader*s Digest story, but such a small response would wreak havoc with the annual budget. Why if everyone gave two cents then where pray tell would we be? There*s staff, utilities and mortgage to pay, not to mention the Sunday school materials to purchase and some months even that*s a stretch. No we*re much better off encouraging abundance giving than praising people who give a heroic pittance. Let*s hear it for *large sums in the treasury*, because that*s just the way thing are. When I try and form a picture in my own mind of the woman at the treasury, I can*t help but think of someone like Marion, a woman I once met, a poor widow herself with a bad heart and diabetes. At the time I met her she was living in subsidized housing, but even so, her five hundred and fifty dollar social security didn*t go very far. Like so many of the working poor, over half of her income went to pay rent. Whatever was left over went to buy food, medicine, pay the electric bill and take care of whatever unexpected emergencies came along. She*d been ill in recent months and the cost of her prescriptions alone had just about wiped her out. So Marion has had to make some hard choices. The city was breathing down her neck because she*d gotten behind on her electric bill to the point that she*d started to get notices in the mail telling her unless she took care of her balance by the end of the month, her service would be cut off. That would be bad news for anyone but even more so for her because there*d be no way to power the electric heart monitor she used at night and she wouldn*t be able to charge the panic button she wore around her neck. *I just don*t know what to do, Pastor. I never supposed this is the way it would be.* She lamented to me in my office. *I*m not out to trick nobody. I just want to get better and get a job. I don*t want to live this way no more.* It seems to me that well to do folks like us view folks like Marion or the nameless widow in today*s gospel lesson in one of two ways, that isn*t it quaint that a poor little old lady drops a couple of pennies in the plate or that they only have themselves to blame for the situation they find themselves in. In either case, we show great disregard and disrespect. There*s nothing romantic and ideal about having to decide which bill to pay or whether to take your medicine. That the nameless widow*s offering couldn*t stack up to that of the big givers watching from the box seats wasn*t fault. Look again at the woman whom Jesus watched that day! She wasn*t a poor widow, but was poor because she was a widow. See, in those days there was no such thing as a rich widow. Women were completely dependent upon their male relatives for everything. To lose your husband was not only an emotional loss, but an economic one as well. If that happened a woman would have to live out her life at the mercy of others, other male relatives or anyone else in the community who might give her something to eat, maybe throw a little money her way, even a couple of copper coins. In reality, those two coins probably were all she had in the whole world. The truth is that like the dollar bills and spare change that we give to the homeless guy standing with his sign by the side of the road, the little bit of change the widow offered that day wasn*t going to make a bit of difference in her life. With or without those little coins, she was still a totally dependent person, dependent on God and her neighbor for everything. She didn*t have a leg to stand on, a single bootstrap to pull herself up with. Here was a person totally dependent on the grace of God. Which is probably more than well to do folks like you or I are willing to admit for ourselves. We buy into the culturally approved idolatry that money busy independence and freedom and the more we have, the less likely we*ll ever have to live like guy with half a foot who props himself on two crutches at Mopac and 2222, like Marion, or like the woman who came to deposit her coins in the treasury. Odds are then that none of us is going to drop our entire paycheck in the offering plate in a few minutes. Rather from the time we*re very young, we are programmed to strive in every way to be like the honored scribes*resourceful, well respected and in command of large sums. But Jesus speaks a clear word of warning to those who make assumptions based on their economic status. What Jesus shows the disciples, what he shows us today is that when all is said and done, it isn*t a matter of how much we can give, but finally what money is for us. As someone once asked, *Is money our heart, our security, our source of power, or is it a tool for something else?* Do we depend on our money to provide us with everything that we need and want from life or do we depend on God to make us rich in the things of His kingdom? To take up the cross and follow Jesus is to walk in the footsteps of the widow, that we live our lives in complete dependence upon God for all that we have and all that we are! Whatever shred of independence she had, she dropped it into the treasury that day, and gave witness to her total reliance on the grace of God. On the fringes of everything you and I hold near and dear, she shows us the way to life rooted in God*s love, the grace of our LORD Jesus Christ and the Communion of the Holy Spirit, lives lived in the assurance of our calling in baptism. God has entrusted everything to us, our selves, our time and our possessions, signs of His gracious love, gifts that we in turn offer back in service to Him as we care for one another and our neighbor, or in the words of the offertory refrain in which we pray to God, Help us raise the poor from trouble, help us give them seeds to sow. You fill our desert with springs of water, you fill our cup it overflows.* As those who see themselves as utterly and completely dependent on God, we are set free to live thankful, joy filled lives. Since the world is in God*s hands, since our lives are in God*s hands too we don*t have to worry about saving, proving or making a name for ourselves. Here in God*s hands we work, rest and one day die confident that even then nothing will be able to separate us from his great love for us in Christ Jesus. And the widow*s astonishing sacrificial gift foretells an even greater gift, the gift that Jesus was to make for her and for us all, his life on the cross. It*s through that gift that sinners like us are forgiven and have life not only today, but for all eternity. *Though he was rich, yet for our sake became poor, so that by his poverty we might become rich.* A lot of fuss over a few coins? You bet. Christ wants everything. But he knows our hearts, that apart from him we can do nothing. So, he comes to us, to bear us in his loving arms, to make us rich in the kingdom, opening our lives to grace filled living as we offer all that we have, all that we are to him. To God be the glory, great things God hath done. Amen. Pastor Brian Peterson References 9. http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=29734691
